Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

New battery came with covers over the terminals which I left on whilst fitting it in the tray.

Thanks, I can see where the covers are now.

Superb?

My brother bought a superb estate recently and it competes with my Ranger on load volume, but not actual payload capacity.

From a practical perspective all (practical) modern cars are vastly superior to their predecessors. I'm fairly sure though if someone stood before me an offered me the keys to say an old (1980s vintage) Merc E class estate or a brand spanking new one I'd chose the older one without having to think for more than a second and be very fucking happy.

Superb?

Yes.

I do get the appeal of older cars but mostly I just want to get where I'm going and not have to think about reliability or maintenance.

The Skoda is easy to drive, efficient, can carry a load of gear, quick enough, comfortable. Just does the job pretty well.

What’s it like for economy?

You can get 40+ mpg on a run with semi responsible driving. 30ish round town.

in general we don't drive in town that much, just the bit to get to the motorway.

I've just realised that there is an exception to the rule about new cars Vs old cars.

Mrs Bobbo announced yesterday that she wanted to trade in the diesel that she currently uses for her commute for an ev. Is told her that it sounds like a great idea but only if she gets a Honda e she agreed we are both pretty excited. It's the first new car that genuinely makes me have the wants for a long, long time.

Thanks. I was expecting better figures.

It's the biggest car in the range with a 220bhp turbo petrol engine, i don't think it's unreasonable.

Even my Alltrack TDi will only get 41mpg at best.

right. i think it's not bad for a large car with a petrol engine.

we don't do that many miles (40k in 5 years) so it's not a huge factor for us.

I drove the 996 today, talk about a contrast. Admittedly it's X74 height which is 30mm lower than stock, and my seat is on the floor (literally, it's as low as it can go without cutting a hole in the shell), but it makes a 206 look like a block of flats when you pull up behind one.

The van has a somewhat different driving position.

Looked at the pics and they look quite funky :) . Are they really £34k?

https://ev-database.uk/car/1171/Honda-e

They come in around £29k after the grant so yes. But this is likely to be a company car so..........

Reminds me of driving the Scooby after having driven the Striker for 2 weeks on a driving tour. The Scooby felt like a double decker bus in comparison.

What model is it? I have looked at Superbes recently. Better value than an A6 and basically the same chassis only a few years older. I would probably look for a diesel though unless I was tempted by something sporty. My current A6 gives around 40mpg but lacks a little oomph although it is ok.

The Passat we have is the B7 170bhp 2.0 TDI from 2014, it's an alltrack though so 4wd and DSG. It's pokey enough for over taking etc esp if you drop it into sport mode.

My Dad had a few Superbs as company cars, tbh if we hadn't wanted the raised ride height of an alltrack i'd have bought one as they are better value

Well, I'm glad I'm not alone in the new/near new car anti-climax. Refinement and reliability really suck the character out of things!

Has anyone ever bought the newest best car they've ever had and realised that the shit cars that came before it were actually better?

Not yet. Mind you, my newest car is nearly 14 years old. And has been at the garage having more work done to it since Thursday. And will be going to another garage for more major works later this year. And possibly an engine rebuild next year.

Thanks for the info. The Passat seems like a good car too. I haven’t really looked at them for some unknown reason. My old boss had/has one with ridiculous miles on it - still going strong when he retired. My father had a GL5? which was quite fast - wheel spin on dry road in 3rd gear! That was mid-80s I guess. I might have to look at Passats. Thanks

We had a Passat TDi before the Skoda. I think it was a 2009 car. It was possible to get up to 700 miles from a tank of diesel, which was nice.

The main thing I didn't like about it was the electric steering; there was zero feedback and quite a pronounced 'float" around the straight ahead position which was quite disconcerting when driving on the motorway in the rain, for example. By comparison, the Skoda steering feels a lot more direct.

On the plus side, it was a very cheap car to own and run.

This Esprit made me smile on the M25 yesterday afternoon.

Would have got a better photo but it says Turbo on the side so no way we could have caught up.

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I think that depends on what you are in, the gearbox on those was notoriously weak so (IIRC) they were limited to around 270 bhp if you wanted to prevent toothy carnage.

God like.

Was awesome to see the Espirit in the Jubilee Bond line up with the DB5 et al.

Obvs all Italian styled.

Didn't one break down?

Thanks for the info. More to ponder.